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The increasing rise of global digital economy is proving that ICT not crude oil is the future of Nigeria.
Countries hoping to improve their revenue generation or national income will have to remodel on digital economy, said Director General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi during a one day stakeholder’s engagement programme in Kaduna to achieve digitization and entrepreneurial traction in Nigeria.
Abdullahi said Nigeria was realising its goal of a digital economy, where the country will generate more revenue from ICT than crude oil.
The event with the theme: ‘Creating Opportunities, Breaking Boundaries: Towards Digitization and Entrepreneurial Evolution,’ brought together technology solution experts, business owners, non-governmental organizations and academics, innovation hubs amongst many others.
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“We are engaging the vast stakeholders because we want to get to the level of the advanced countries, where we can generate more revenue from tapping into ICT than crude oil,” said Abdullahi while declaring the programme open. He was represented by the Agency’s Director of Zonal Offices Directorate, Babajide Ajayi.
“We are in the process of realising our dream of a booming digital economy. You will notice that our Ministry, formally known as Communications was changed to Communications and Digital Economy. This is not just for the sake of changing name but to ensure we achieve all forms of Digitization in this country.”
“In addition to that, our Policy Document, SRAP 2021-2024, that is our Strategic Roadmap and Action Plan, will serve as the guide to the Agency towards the realisation of Nigeria’s vision to digitization,” he Added.
According to Abdullahi, NITDA deems it necessary to continuously collaborate with its stakeholders across sectors to ensure that developments at the national level simmer down to the states and local governments.
“In addition to that, we also need to hear from them where we are doing well and where they think we are not doing well enough. We have had similar engagement meetings in Gombe, Bauchi, Lagos, Ogun and Kano States. And we are getting a good response because there are things we didn’t even know about that are coming out, and we are taking these feedback back to Abuja to map out how we can have a better working relationship with the stakeholders,” he said.
Also speaking, the Head of North-West Zonal office of NITDA, Alhaji Sheikh Abubakar Lawan said the agency was putting measures in place to address fraudulent activities associated with Information Technology which has being the fear of many stakeholders.
